According to the International Centre for Prison Studies, the United States has the largest prison population in the world. By current estimates, over two million inmates are incarcerated in U.S. prisons. In general, inmates that have been convicted of felony offenses serve longer sentences in prisons (e.g., federal or state prisons), whereas inmates that have been convicted of misdemeanors receive shorter sentences that are typically served in jails (e.g., county jail). In addition, upon being detained by authorities, an inmate may serve significant periods of time incarcerated in a local jail while awaiting release on bond and, in some cases, while awaiting trial. During all of these periods of incarceration, an inmate may have opportunities to communicate with the outside world.
By allowing inmates to communicate with friends and family while incarcerated, the justice system aims to facilitate their transition back into society upon release. Traditional visitation sessions provided by controlled-environment facilities include telephone calls and in-person visits. More recently, technological advances and the proliferation of affordable mobile devices enabling various forms of communication have allowed controlled-environment facilities to provide other types of visitation sessions, including video conferences, email and online chat sessions. As these advances have continued, the use of virtual reality is becoming more commonplace.
Virtual reality allows a user to view, and to some extent interact with, a virtual three-dimensional environment generated through the execution of a virtual reality software program and displayed to the user via a specially configured headset. The virtual reality programs may support more than one user participating in virtual reality session, in which case each participant or portion of that participant may be represented within the virtual environment via an avatar. A resident of a controlled-environment facility may be subject to various restrictions with regard to personal behavior and communicating with other residents and visitors. In certain scenarios, it may be necessary to apply such restrictions to a resident's participation in virtual reality sessions.